In modern vehicle controls, a plurality of inputs, which are in part mutually contradictory, operate on the available actuating members (for example, drive unit, transmission, et cetera). For example, the drive unit of a vehicle is intended to be controlled on the basis of: a drive command pregiven by the driver; desired values from external and/or internal control functions such as a drive slip control, an engine drag torque control, a transmission control, an rpm and/or speed limiting and/or an idle rpm control. These desired inputs exhibit, in part, a mutually contradictory character so that, since the drive unit can only adjust one of these desired value inputs, these desired value inputs must be coordinated, that is, a desired value input to be realized has to be selected.
In connection with the control of a drive unit, such a coordination of various desired torque values is known from DE 197 39 567 A1. Here, a desired value is selected from the torque desired values via maximum and/or minimum value selection. In the instantaneous operating state, this desired value is realized from the determination of the quantities of individual control parameters of the drive unit, for example, in an internal combustion engine, the charge, the ignition angle and/or the quantity of fuel to be injected. Various characteristics can be connected with the desired inputs, for example, with respect to the required dynamic of the adjustment, the priority, et cetera. These characteristics likewise can have a mutually contradictory nature and are not considered in the known coordination of the desired inputs.
In order to consider also such characteristics, it is provided in unpublished German patent application 199 61 291.9 of Dec. 18, 1999, to coordinate the characteristics assigned to the particular desired torques likewise by means of a coordinator in a comparable manner in order to obtain a resulting characteristic vector which forms the basis of the adjustment of the actuating variables of the drive unit.
In the known solution, the desired torques are combined based on their effect in maximum and minimum value selection stages and are coordinated separately for the slow (charge) control path and the rapid (ignition) control path. The consequence is a relatively complex structure having interfaces adapted especially to the particular configuration of the drive unit (for example, a spark-ignition engine).